On Fire
by Fire on the Wind
Summary: A bus catches on fire, and everyone gets off untouched... exept one girl.
1. Chapter 1

This is my first fanfic. No flames. You get a cookie if you notice the book quote I used here and tell me what book it's from. Also, this is like 5 chapters, because I'm really dumb and just figured out how to work the site, sothere probably won't be a lot of chapters this long. OK, on with the fanfic!

Ruby Myers woke up. Her black-brown hair was all over her face. She yawned, put on her glasses, and looked at the clock. It had gone off ten minutes early again.

_How nice,_ she thought. She reluctantly got out of her warm bed and threw on some blue-green pants and a red shirt. The only time her clothes ever matched was an accident. She tried to pull a comb through her ratty hair. She failed.

_Oh well...I look fine_. Ruby dragged herself downstairs and ate a bowl of cereal. It was her first year at her high school and she felt like she was already a loser. Not that she cared. What's the point of being popular anyway? All the popular people were idiots. Her alarm clock went off again. She had to set one to leave for school because she was so... absentminded.

She sighed, got her coat and backpack, and trudged to the corner of the street.  
There were ten boys Ruby's age on her street, and no girls. Sometimes she wished she could just go to a friend's house and talk, but that didn't happen. Her only two friends lived across town. When the bus came, Ruby waited for everyone else to get on, just like every other day, then went and sat in her seat in the back of the bus. She leaned her head against the window and let her thoughts wander.

_Nothing ever happens to me,_ thought Ruby gloomily. _I lead the most boring life ever._ Just then, out her window, Ruby saw a faint greenish glow coming toward the bus.

A boy with bright blue eyes and raven hair was running to his school.

"Yes! For once! I won't be late today!" The boy, whose name was Danny Fenton, yelled. The second he touched the door of Casper High, a blue mist seeped from his mouth. _Oh, great..._

"I am Technus! Master of all things mechanical and-"

"Can I have one day, ONE DAY without being late?" Danny yelled. "Going ghost!" Two blue rings slid over his body. When they disappeared, he had white hair electric green eyes, and a black and silver jumpsuit. He jumped into the air and started firing green bolts at the ghost.

Two kids saw Danny change from inside their classroom. One was a gothic-looking girl, wearing a purple and black sleeveless top, and a plaid miniskirt. The other was a boy with a darker complexion, who had on a backwards red cap, baggy pants and a yellow shirt.

"Mr. Lancer, may I use the restroom?" they asked in unison.

"Fine, fine," their teacher sighed. This was the fourth time in three days.

They both jumped out of their seats and ran outside to the battling ghosts.

"Tucker, Sam, why aren't you in class?" Danny asked.

"You know, we were, but then we saw you from Mr. Lancer's room and decided to tell you," Tucker said.

"What! Very ba-"

The ghost, Technus, took that opportunity to knock Danny out of the air. Then he sped away.

"Well, at least he's not right in front of Mr. Lancer's room anymore," observed Tucker.

Danny sat up and rubbed his head. "Pretty obvious there, Tuck. Well, I'd better follow him..."

"Don't worry, Danny. We'll cover for you," Sam said, and she helped him up. Thank you, Sam, THANK YOU," Danny said. He flew away.

He followed Technus for a long time. After a while, Danny started getting tired. He wondered if he was even in his state anymore. Just then Technus dove. He had spotted a school bus full of kids about Danny's age. He flew into the engine.

"Hey! What are you doing!" shouted Danny. He pulled out the Fenton Thermos and took the cap off. Technus was sucked inside, and Danny flew away. But it was too late. A little flame flickered in the engine, and soon the whole thing was ablaze.

Ruby saw all of it. She had been looking out the window, bored, while everyone else talked and played around. Then she saw the two - things, they reminded her of ghosts, but that was impossible- fight. After the boy had done something to make the other go away, he'd flown off. Ruby just sat there, gaping out the window. Then her brain turned on.

_That was amazing, whatever it was... WAIT THE BUS IS ON FIRE!_

By now the inside of the bus was getting hot, and a few of the seats had caught fire.

"EVERYONE GET OFF THE BUS! Ruby yelled. Everyone stared at her. They looked at the bus driver to see what it was about, and caught sight of the engine. Half the kids started screaming, and the other half turned chalk white. The bus driver whistled.

"EVERYBODY! We will calmly get off the bus NOW." she said, in a commanding tone.

All the kids looked at her. Then, they stood up shakily and started getting off. Ruby, having sat in the last seat, like always, was last in line to get off. She was just about to step onto the stairs, when she slipped in a big pile of glowing green goo. It covered her and she blacked out.

After school, Danny sighed and dropped himself on his bed. He'd been grounded for a month for disappearing from the first four periods of school. He could hear his parents watching the TV downstairs.

"-school bus about 100 miles south of Amity Park caught fire in a freak engine accident. It's not apparent what caused it but there was one girl reported missing..." Danny stopped listening. That sounded like... DUH!

_Why didn't I turn around before flying off! I am so STUPID!_

Danny went ghost and flew off in the direction he had that morning, to look for the missing girl.

Ruby slowly woke up. She had no idea what time it was, or how long she had been out. The bus was charred and black. Wait... the fire... she remembered that...

_If there was a fire and I fainted, why aren't I dead?_

She stood up and looked around. Only then she noticed she was invisible.

"AAAAAAHHHH!" she yelled and jumped about a foot in the air. "I don't want to be invisible! Why is this happening!" She popped back to normal. But it wasn't really normal, was it? She was wearing a jumpsuit, not too different from the one she saw that boy wear, but hers, instead of being black and silver, was dark orange and red. It also had a little flame on the chest. Ruby shook her head.

_This is a dream; there's no WAY this is really happening to me..._

When she shook her head, she saw the tips of her hair. They were blonde.

_Huh? What the..._ Ruby was really confused now. She pulled out a hair. It was deep red at the top, then it faded to orange, and finally to blonde at the bottom.

Now she just felt like curling up in a corner and crying. "What happened to me?"  
Ruby sobbed. Then she saw something come through the blackened roof of the bus. It was Danny.

Danny looked at Ruby curiously.

"Are you the girl that was on the bus this morning? Why are you wearing that?"

"I don't know," Ruby replied. "Why are you? Wait... I remember you! You're the thing from this morning! You set our bus on FIRE and DIDN'T EVEN TURN AROUND TO SEE IF WE WERE GOING TO BE ALRIGHT!" Ruby was screaming as loud as she could at Danny now. "I SHOULD-"

_WHOOSH_

Danny jumped about two feet in the air and took a step backwards. Ruby was still yelling. "WHAT ARE YOU LOOKING AT?" She glared at Danny.

_CRACKLE CRACKLE_

"Y- your hair..." Danny trailed off. He had seen ghosts, certainly, but this girl didn't look like a ghost. His ghost sense hadn't gone off, either. What had startled him was that while Ruby was screaming at him, her hair had burst into flames.

"Yeah, I_know_ it's the wrong color!" She pulled some from behind her shoulder. "Even _I_ can see-" Ruby had finally looked at her hair.

"AAAAAHHH!" she yelled and, her hair went out.

Danny broke in. "Look, before you scream at me again, I'm sorry. I didn't know the bus was on fire. I just wanted to get to school on time... for once..."

"Okay, fine," said Ruby. "I just want to know what happened to me... or you and me... this is just so confusing..." Ruby leaned against the wall of the bus, sat down and sighed. As soon as she hit the floor, she turned invisible.

"AAH! WHY IS THIS HAPPENING TO ME!"

Danny was staring as he watched this. It was exactly how he had felt when he got his powers. He sat down next to Ruby.

"I'm Danny Fen-Phantom. Um... well, I think I might have some idea of what happened to you. I was turned into a ghost by a machine, and it looks like you have some of the same powers as me. I have no idea where the fire came from though, so don't ask me." Danny said. He didn't see a reason not to tell her. She was going through the same thing he was, and even if she did tell anybody, nobody believed in ghosts anyway. "What's the last thing you remember before you blacked out?"

"How did you know I fainted?" asked Ruby suspiciously.

"Duh," said Danny. "If you hadn't blacked out and gone invisible, you would have gotten off the bus, and you wouldn't be all over the news as "MISSING'."

"Oh. Well, I remember slipping on glowing green goo, the fire getting closer, and that was it."

"Oookaay..." Danny said slowly. "Umm... maybe that goo- it's called ectoplasm- it probably gave you the ghost powers, and then the fire gave you the fire powers. Does that make any sense at all?"

"No," said Ruby. She had the concept, but she was still completely confused. "But then, neither does anything else that's happened to me in the last day, so I'll accept that."

"Good." said Danny. "Well, I can't help you with the fire, but it would be good if you had some basic control over your powers, don't you think?"

"Yeah..." Ruby looked down through her invisible self. "It'd be pretty bad if I did this at school..."

"I had problems with that, too. How about we work on that first. See, this whole ghost thing just happens when you think. You think about being invisible, it happens. You think about going back to normal..."

Ruby appeared. "That's cool! What else can I do?"

"Not sure exactly." Danny said. "But we can try the powers I have." Danny was thinking how much easier it would have been if he had someone to tell him how to use his powers. "I've always liked flight." He rose into the air and smiled.

Ruby jumped into the air -and fell with a big THUD.

"I guess I don't have that one," sighed Ruby.

"I think you're trying too hard," said Danny. "Just think about it. Don't jump."

"Okay." Ruby closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and rose into the air.

"I CAN FLY!" Ruby was really happy. She had always wanted to fly.

"Fine. The next one I can teach you is intangibility." Danny put his hand through the charred bus seat in front of them. So did Ruby, with no trouble at all.

"That one is easy," she said. "Is that all?"

"One more," said Danny, "assuming you didn't plan to wear that to school," he said, pointing to her jumpsuit, "and your hair isn't normally three colors."

"Yeah. So what is it?"

"To change back, you concentrate hard on your human self and you'll-"

Danny was cut off as two blue rings slid around him as they did that morning, transforming him back into Danny Fenton. Two seconds later, they came back, and he was a ghost again. He looked completely shocked.

"OOPSsorrythatwasn'tsupposedtohappenOK_BYE_!"  
(Authors note: If you understood that, you get a cookie.)

Danny flew away looking startled.

Ruby sat on the floor. She had seen about two seconds of a boy with bright blue eyes and black hair.

Ruby blinked. He'd gone so fast... Ruby shook herself.

_So if that wasn't a dream... then I can do this!_

She slid through the wall of the bus, and landed on her back.

_Ow..._ That was cool. It was all concept. Very kung fu. If you wish it, it shall be. _And now I fly home!_ Ruby thought happily.

"THIS IS GREAT!" Ruby screamed. She'd always wanted to fly, and it was great. Ruby giggled as she circled and flipped her way across town to her house. When she got there, she collapsed onto her bed and concentrated on herself as a human. Two flaming rings passed across Ruby. Surprisingly, they didn't catch anything on fire, though. Ruby had dark brown hair and normal clothes on again. The last thing she remembered thinking before falling dead asleep was,

_Well, I definitely can't say I live the most boring life on earth now..._

"YOU TOLD HER WHAT!" Sam and Tucker yelled. They were on the phone with Danny, and he had just told them the whole story of what happened.

"What?" Danny asked. "All I told her was that I was turned into a ghost by a machine. I didn't tell her my name or anything."

"You never think, Danny," Sam said. "There are not many people who own u anything</u that can do that, even by accident. So naturally, she would think the people who have a machine that could accidentally turn someone into a ghost, are the same people who have a house that looks like a UFO landed on it."

"Ohhh... I'm so DUMB..." Danny groaned.

"Oh, don't worry, Danny," said Tucker. "What are the chances of her even coming over to Amity anyway?"

Ruby woke up and yawned sleepily. She pushed her hair off her face and looked at her clock. It was only 8 a.m. Why was she up so early on Saturday? She remembered what happened on the bus.

_That was an amazing dream,_ she thought, as she put one foot out of bed. It didn't touch the floor.

_What the..._ Ruby looked over the edge of her bed and almost screamed. Her foot was going through the floor. She pulled it out and sat up on her bed.

_So it wasn't a dream..._

Yay for my first fic! R&R OR ELSE! I am not continuing till I get 5 reviews. Or a week. Yeah, I am the least patient person in the world.


	2. Chapter 2

_So it hadn't been a dream,_ thought Ruby. I am... something else. Maybe a ghost.. that boy, Danny had said he was a ghost, but she was different. But, getting back to the present, should she tell her parents? What would they do? They were scientists, very dedicated to their work.  
_  
Best not to,_ thought Ruby. She didn't want anybody to know about this, especially anyone who might do experiments on her. She stood up, and walked downstairs. She was still in her clothes from the day before.

"Mom, Dad" she called as she walked down the stairs.

"RUBY" Her parents came running up to her. "You're up! We saw you in your bed this morning, but we didn't see you come in, or anybody bring you here. What happened"

"Ummmm... I don't remember. I passed out." Ruby said nervously. It wasn't completely a lie.

"Well, this settles it. We're moving" her dad said.

"WHAT" Ruby had to concentrate s hard as she could to keep her hair from catching fire again. They were acting like it was no big deal! Did they even plan to TELL her?

"Well... we got a job offer a few days ago" explained Ruby's mom"For a place a couple hours north of here. We were going to tell you yesterday, but... well.."

"And now we are definitely moving" finished her dad. "I want you to be someplace... safer."

"AAHH" Ruby scremed in frustration, and her hair started smoking. "I'M GOING FOR A WALK" she screamed, then ran outside and slammed the door. As soon as she got outside, she stopped concentrating and her hair burst into flames.

_Why do they have to do this! At least I have TWO friends, and now they have to go and move..._

Without thinking, Ruby changed.

_"What the... oh yeah. Oh, I can fly now!_ Ruby lifted off into the air. It made her feel so much better, now that she was dipping in and out of clouds, under the bright morning sun. She could see her whole town from here. Suddenly, a little flame crept from the side of her mouth and drifted up into the air. Right as she went under a cloud, she saw something glowing shoot past.

_Can I breath fire now, too?_ she wondered. She tried to do it again, but, it didn't work.

_Oh, well,_ Ruby thought. In about an hour, when she finally landed, she was feeling breathless, but a hundred times happier than she had that morning. She could make new friends where she was moving, and it wasn't like she was completely out of touch with her old ones, either.

_I love flying..._ She thought about Danny. He'd said she wasn't completely the same as him.. she had his powers, but with fire.

_One time when having two hundred science fiction books comes in handy!_

Ruby sat down in her beanbag chair with some of her favorite books.

Danny Phantom was going for a joyride. Not only was he grounded for a month after leaving school yesterday, after disappearing after school that same day, he had to stay in his room for a week exept for meals and school. He knew he shouldn't be doing this, but he desperatly needed fresh air.

Danny was sick and tired of getting in trouble every day for disappearing when he was supposed to be doing something. But, he loved flying, and he could never stay mad when he was in the air. It was so beautiful, the clear blue sky, and the wind in his face.

_What a perfect day,_ thought Danny. Just then he saw a flash of glowing red vanish under a cloud. Danny sighed, wondering why there were so many ghosts, and followed. He didn't stop to think about why his ghost sense didn't go off.

Danny noticed that this ghost was behaving a little... strangely. It wasn't trying to wreck anything, or even trying to scare anyone. It was just flying around. As Danny continued to follow it, something about it started to seem familiar. This wasn't a ghost he captured in the Fenton Thermos before, but still...

It had done a few loops around the town, when suddenly it slowed down.

_Yes!_ thought Danny happily. _I'll catch it now!_ The ghost had stopped, and Danny finally got a good look at it. It was the girl from yesterday! She phased through the window. Danny watched as two flaming rings slid around her, the same way they did on him, and turned her human. She was a girl about his age with dark brown hair and glasses. Danny smiled and flew away. Even if she ever did find out who he was, he knew who she was now, too.

Ruby had come to a conclusion. Well, a close to a conclusion as she was going to get, considering all these books were on supposedly 'nonexistent' creatures. She was an elemental. Quote, A very rare mythological creature with the powers of one of the four elements: fire, water, earth, or wind. They are also immune to their own element; fire cannot be burned, water can breath underwater, etc. The elementals are often mistaken for ghosts, having all of the same powers, but they are not dead... Ruby had stopped there. It looked as close as she was going to get. So she was Ruby Fire, the fire elemental.

The next week was very uneventful, for both Ruby and Danny. Ruby was getting better with her powers; she noticed her fire didn't hurt or catch anything on fire unless she wanted it to, and Danny had told Sam and Tucker that he at least knew what that girl with the fire looked like. A week later, it was Sunday. But more importantly, it was the Sunday Ruby Myer and her family moved.

Ruby was still a little sad. She had meant to tell her parents she didn't want to move, but they had seemed so excited about it, and now it was too late. They'd bought the house and the movers were here. Ruby sighed and picked up the last box of her stuff to carry to the moving van. She put in in the van and got in her car. Ruby sighed as she caught her last glance at her house, and watched as the town she'd lived in for her whole life rolled away.

Ruby started thinking about where she was going to live. She'd missed the name, but she remembered her parents saying something abut it being more like a city than the places they had been before. She was going to have to walk to school, which was new. Ruby hoped she would make at least one friend. She was thinking about this when a little flame crept out of the corner of her mouth. She turned just in time to see a little glowing green man in overalls go into their moving van.

_What was that?_ Ruby thought. She decided to check it out. She went fire (which is what I'm going to call it from now on, because it sounds better than 'elemental', plus, it's shorter.) and two flaming rings passed over her. Unfortunately, her dad noticed.

"Ruby, what was that" he asked, not taking his eyes off the road.

"Um... my flashlight" Ruby replied very nervously. "Yeah, I, uh took it with me because it wouldn't fit in the other boxes."

"Well, keep it off."

"Okay, Dad" Ruby replied just as she phased out of the car.

She flew back to the moving van and phased into it, where she saw the little glowing guy going through her stuff.

"HEY" Ruby yelled. "That's mine"

He turned to her. "I AM THE BOX GHOST! MASTER OF ALL CONTAINERS CARDBOARD AND SQUARE"

"Okay, fine. But can you get out of my stuff"

"NO ONE TELLS THE BOX GHOST WHAT TO DO! BEWARE MY CARDBOARD VENGANCE"

The Box Ghost made an empty box fly at Ruby, which she caught easily.

"I'm asking you nicely for the last time. Get out of this stuff."

"NO! I SHALL"

But he was cut off, because at 'NO' Ruby had tackled him. It ended with Ruby standing on top of the box ghost.

"Will you leave it alone now" Ruby asked dangerously. The box ghost looked scared for a brief moment. Then, he yelled,

"BEWARE" and phased through the bottom of the truck. Ruby put all of the stuff The Box Ghost had taken out back into the boxes, and went back to her car, where she went back human.

"Ruby, keep the flashlight off" her dad said.

"Okay" Ruby said, getting buckled. "Where are we moving again, Mom"

"I already told you, it's called Amity Park.

Maddie Fenton looked out the window. "Jack, Jazz, Danny, we have new neighbors! Let's go welcome them."

"I don't have to, because I'm grounded, right" asked Danny, sounding hopeful.

"No, you're coming" said his mom.

"Alright" sighed Danny.

Ruby stepped out of the car at the same time Danny stepped out of his house. When they saw each other, they stared and their mouths dropped open.

Ruby's eyes met Danny's. He was staring at her as if he'd seen a ghost. (lol) Ruby looked thoughtfully at Danny.

_I've seen him somewhere before..._ Ruby thought to herself. _But then I couldn't have... we live about two hours away..._ Then it hit her. He was that ghost kid from the bus! Wow, that was strange... they'd moved in right next to someone who was probably the only person with powers like hers.

She opened her mouth to say something. "Hey"

But Danny cut her off. "Hey, come look at... um..." Danny paused"this thing... over here" he finished, somewhat lamely, as he started pulling Ruby toward the back of her new house.

"Well, hi..." Ruby said. "You're Danny Phantom, right"

"Yeah... well, I'm Danny _Fenton_..." Danny said. "And you're... that girl... from the bus..."

"Right" replied Ruby. "My name's Ruby. I'm a fire elemental. Why did you pull me over here, and how did you recognize me"

"See, I was flying, and I saw you, so I thought you were another ghost, and I followed you."

"Oh. Wait, another ghost? As in, you get a lot"

"Yeah. My parents are a little... to put it mildly, obsessed. They built a portal, which is supposed to let ghosts out of the ghost world, it's called the Ghost Zone, and into ours. When they built it, it didn't exactly work, so they gave up. I went inside it- yes, I know that was dumb" he added at the expression on Ruby's face. "and I accidentally hit a button. The portal turned on, and I passed out. When I woke up, I was in my ghost form. I pulled you away because I don't want my parents to find out about me. I'm not sure what they would do."

"I can understand that" Ruby said. "My parents are scientists. I haven't told them, either."

Danny opened his mouth to reply, but at that point, a large man in a orange lab suit ran over to Danny and grabbed his arm. "DANNY! Help me tell the new neighbors all about GHOSTS! He started pulling Danny toward the front of the house.

"Ruby this is my dad..." Danny said.

Ruby had a look on her face that clearly said, 'this is what he has to live with?'. In the front, Mrs. Fenton was saying something about ghosts, while Ruby's parents were looking at them, very obviously pretending to be interested, and Ruby didn't blame them. A month ago, If someone would've told her ghosts existed, she would have had to try hard to keep from laughing in their face.

"So" said Mr. Myer, finally speaking"have you ever actually _seen_ a ghost"

"Once, said Jack. This got the Myers' attention. "It was on our anniversary. It kept flying around and yelling, 'I AM THE BOX GHOST!'"

Ruby was surprised at this. That was the ghost she'd seen on the way here.

"Hey, Ruby, I'll help you carry your stuff to your room" offered Danny.

"Okay" agreed Ruby. She grabbed a box, and Danny grabbed the one next to it.

"Something you wanted to say" she asked Danny.

"Yeah, have you seen the box ghost? Because I saw that look on your face when my parents mentioned him."

"On the way here, he was trying to take our stuff in the moving van. All the ghosts can't be that pathetic, can they"

"No. Definitely not. See, I fight them with my powers, and the machines my parents make."

"I was wondering about that. If your parents make ghost hunting stuff, why haven't they figured you out yet" Ruby got to her room and started taking her things out of the box she was carrying.

"It's weird. They think my sister Jazz is a ghost, but all their inventions point to me and say 'ghost' but they think they're all broken."

"That's convenient." They started outside, and had to quit talking. Danny saw two people pass by the house just as he got outside.

"Sam! Tuck" he called, and they came over. "Hey! This is Ruby." He gestured toward Ruby. "Ruby, this is Sam" he pointed to the gothic girl. "and Tucker." he pointed toward the boy. "Ruby's my new next door neighbor. You know what, in about an hour, we should all meet a my house."

Sam and Tucker knew this usually meant something about ghosts. Was he planning to tell _Ruby_!

"Okay Danny..." they said together.

Sorry I took so long after saying I'd post… please review!


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